The world is going to pieces... but why? Is it a deep structural process? Or the agency of a few deranged dictators and obnoxious plutocrats? Or, perhaps, derangement is itself a kind of structural process?

I used to study theory at Moscow State University, but then I moved into empirical political economy. And yet theoretical leanings remain. I am interested in 'objective' things, such as economic processes and capitalist contradictions, as well as 'subjective' things, such as ideologies, strategies, and interests. I have mostly studied Russia, its political cleavages, state-business relations, social policy and recently, imperialist aggression. I am currently interested in the multiplicity and interplay of global imperialisms, of which Russia is, sadly, one among several examples.

I worked at a university in Saint Petersburg for many years. Then 24 February 2022 happened. Since then, I have lived in different places. I was fortunate enough to work as a visiting scholar at the University of California, Berkeley, for two years. I am currently based in Belgrade, Serbia, where I am involved in several research and educational projects. The most important among them is the Public Sociology Laboratory, a collective of politically engaged scholars studying social, political, and economic processes in the post-Soviet region.

As a result of my public criticism of dictatorship and war, the Russian Ministry of Justice declared me a 'foreign agent #839'. Oh well.

My most recent academic article is called 'Paradise lost: Russian multinationals under deglobalization, 2014–2021' (co-authored with Anna Mishura). It is published in Post-Communist Economies.

Another recent one is 'From the Chicago Boys to Hjalmar Schacht: The Trajectory of the (Neo)liberal Economic Expertise in Russia'. Published in Problems of Post-Communism 71 (6), 2024.

In terms of non-academic writing, check out this one: 'We Live in a World of Growing Imperialist Rivalries' (Jacobin, May 2024).

I would be happy to write an op-ed, give a talk or collaborate in other ways. Please reach me at
ilyamatveev1 at protonmail dot com

I am also (still) on Twitter.